


Marshes Seep of Things Unseen

by baeberiibungh



Category: Supernatural
Genre: AU, F/M, Horror, Hunters, Infanticide, M/M, Monsters, Sam POV kinda, based on folklore, demonic babies, lying about death, multiple infanticide, sam centric
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-07
Updated: 2015-09-07
Packaged: 2018-04-19 14:36:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,276
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4749980
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/baeberiibungh/pseuds/baeberiibungh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Samuel is known as a brave man, one who has wed the prettiest girl in the village and that his loyalty to his brother is absolute. How far will he be so obedient?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Marshes Seep of Things Unseen

**Author's Note:**

> I have tagged as much i can, in case i missed anything let me know and i will add it.

In the village of Roden there lived a young man, with flowing locks that reached his back, dimples that flashed at every smile, eyes that crinkled in kindness and warmth at whoever they were directed at and a stature that made him one of the strongest man of the village. He was Samuel of the village of Roden, named so for the village was full of rhododendron trees, old and majestic, and almost perpetually flowering. Some said he was the luckiest of them as well for he managed to win the heart of the beautiful Ruby with the bow lips the hue of her name and black tresses that always smelled like flowers. 

Equally famed and beloved was his big brother Deann the Gutcutter from the village of Roden. He had a house next to his younger brother’s. Sadly he did not have a wife and thus no children. Unlike his brother who had long hair as was the norm for married men in the village, his was shorn short like that of a monk. He was kind, sweet, brave and absolutely ruthless when it came to anything that sought to harm his village or his family. He gained the name of Gutcutter after winning a fight with a grotesque monster that was terrorising a neighbouring village. 

Both Samuel and Deann were good hunters, and why should they be not, they were the sons of the godclaimed Johnn the Ferocious. He was feared as much as respected and even after been dead for years his name could make the stoutest shiver in dread. His sons had inherited his unbounded bravery and courage, but they learned to be kinder and softer in their dealing with everyone from their beloved uncle Bobby the Jaje. The most knowledgeable and wise man in the village, he was held as the proxy village elder. Both had perished by the time this story starts, but these things are important too.

Their mother used to be a princess guide, one of the best ones. She knew how to track anything and knew how to build hundred of traps to catch many animals and birds. While Mariam was alive, called as Mary by many in respect, their dinner table was always full at every meal and Johnn didn’t even know how she did it. She could hold her own against Bobby and was an exquisite archer as well. Samuel used some of her tools as of yet, finding them to be unbeaten by anything new or innovative. She had died trying to save a bunch of people who were travelling under her protection. No one even received one scratch, but she broke her back and died immediately.

So both the boys were orphan by the time Deann was in his late teens, but he took care of his brother, did not let all the knowledge accumulated by his uncle and father go to waste, and helped people as much as he could. Once Samuel was old enough he helped too, but he liked farming their family farm more and when his eyes started to stick to Ruby the Vivacious for longer and longer moments, Deann took pity on him and went to Ruby’s parents to ask for her honour to be bound with his brothers. Her parents complied, Johana her sister giggled a lot and Ruby herself agreed with a smirk that made Samuel blush later. 

Deann was used to go on hunts alone now. Samuel was a family man now, and unless explicitly required did not need to fight. He took over the records of the monsters they kept coming across and relaying any needed information to people who hunted monsters like them. It had been a few months or so after Samuel’s marriage that Deann had stumbled back into their courtyard with a human shaped bundle covered in his cloak. Samuel came and helped him carry the person inside and watched awestruck at the individual that Deann had picked up. He was already going through his head as to what the creature might be when Deann had helped it sip gulps of water and it had opened its eyes to reveal blue eyes. 

It was as if something ethereal had stepped through him. There was just so much time in those eyes, millennia, understanding everything, a kindness that reminded Samuel of his mother, his father, uncle, even his brother and wife and the love he felt for them, near about tearing up. When Deann turned the person towards himself, perhaps to clean his face for he had a wet rag in his hand, Samuel gasped at the two long gashes running almost parallel over the back. They were just scabbing over, blood still seeping through in some places and looking immensely painful. 

Deann called out to him, “I will take care of this Sammy, you go now, Ruby will begin to worry. We will talk tomorrow.”

Samuel nodded his head, understanding that Deann did not want him to tell anyone anything, even Ruby. So he went to his house that shared the same courtyard with Deann’s house and clutched Ruby to his chest and fell into a deep sleep. Deann will tell what he has to tell when he will want to tell. 

The next morning, Samuel went to Deann’s house and found the man, he could see now it was a man now, was sitting on a bed with Deann sitting beside him, holding his hand and looking at each other with such an intense look on their faces that Samuel felt embarrassed for some reason. Deann started and make a aborted motion, the man merely turned his intense look to Samuel and neither let go of the other’s hands. Something was clicking in Samuel’s brain, but he would like to be told by his big brother directly. It was not sin or anything after all. 

“Hey, uh, hey Sammy. This, um, this is Castiel. He... I, I found him yesterday trying to get away from the thing I was hunting yesterday and I brought him, um, home,” Deann said, blushing and looking at Castiel every now and then. 

“Ok” Samuel says in a neutral tone. Deann frowns at that a bit but the turns back to Castiel as if he cannot not see his face for long. Seeing how engrossed they are in each other, Samuel bows out and goes to tell his dear Ruby that Deann has finally found his one. While it was not common that people couple with a physical manifestation similar to their own, it was still considered natural. Love was honoured and respected as love in spite of everything.

***************************************************************************

A year after Castiel came into Deann’s life, it had become so much more sweeter. He had taken to the life with no problem, adding a little bee hive for honey, for it was his favourite thing to share, and always being there when Deann needed him. He was an equally adept hunter, knew how to track as well as Mary, had superhuman strength and a disposition that made mothers hand him their crying firstborns for him to hold. It was almost miraculous how easily he could stop the crying, rocking them in his hands, that looked awkward, but was immensely soothing. He made herbal teas to heal small fevers and cuts and he became an important figure of the household, of the same standing as Ruby did among the brothers. 

And Deann, Samuel could not believe how happy Deann was. He felt slightly ashamed that he was not aware before that Deann was not happy, might have even been sad, but Castiel, with just one look would make Deann smile sunny. That sight coupled with a glowing Ruby, heavy with their yet to be born child was all Samuel required. It was the happiest he could ever remember feeling. He knew that Deann and Castiel, who had grown to be a good friend of Samuel, would both be the best uncles to look after his children, with utmost devotion to their safety. So happy he was that he steadily kept missing the stressed looks that passed between them as Ruby neared her delivery date.

Her water broke in the evening and the midwife came to help with the birthing process, Samuel, Deann and Castiel waiting outside so as to give them privacy. Other people kept to their homes, it was not a time to suffocate the couple yet. When the baby has been delivered, the neighbours would pour in with gifts and food and bless the family with happiness and goodness. So the only people there were Ruby, the midwife Ellen and Ruby’s sister Jo while Samuel, Castiel and Dean kept vigil outside. It took hours, Samuel having forced Deann and Castiel to go inside and take rest and Deann did not protest for Castiel was looking sick. For someone as emphatic as him, it was beyond torture. 

As soon as the baby was out with a happy whisper of ‘It’s a boy’, Ellen had smiled at him while she held the baby to him in a clean loincloth. Samuel had been quite overcome with emotions and headed immediately to Deann’s to show them their nephew. He found them both sitting in the bed in the front room, looking positively weary and stressed. Deann looked at Castiel and when he squeezed his hand, he turned back to Samuel and with a voice as hard he could make it, said, “Sammy, you have to take the baby to the marshes beyond the village near the Tether forest and put it in the ground and cover it with a stone before the sun is up. Don’t, ...” here Deann faltered even though Castiel held him, “Don’t worry it won’t make a sound. But you must go now.”

Samuel looked on in disbelief, at the man who had basically bought him up, the man who couldn’t say no to him, his friend sitting nearby and the looks of aghast sadness on their face and they did not take their words back. Samuel opened his mouth a few times, to perhaps say no, to maybe ask why, but he closed his mouth each time. Just as Deann couldn’t say no to him, Samuel couldn’t say no to him as well. He looked at the couple in reproach, took a shuddering breath, and went home. Ruby was dozing, just about to fall asleep, the midwife tinkering around washing her implements and Jo already knocked out. Ruby mumbled something at him, so he showed her the baby’s face. She smiled at the baby without actually seeing anything and went off to sleep, and when the midwife tried to take the baby away, Samuel did not let her. 

It was just one hour to dawn, so he turned and walked to the main door and looked at Ruby. At Jo, at the midwife, at his brother’s house, while he felt their looks on him and set out to the marsh. Ruby had been inconsolable next morning. ‘I did not even get to see him, his face, I did not even see his face’ she kept crying. Jo sat stony faced, shocked and stunned at the appearance of sadness so suddenly when she had been accepting happiness. Ellen kept her mouth shut but her eyes went a bit hard every time it landed on Samuel. No one said anything, Castiel made Ruby drink some of his herb tea but it did not help. It was a mother’s grief after all, not to be washed away so easily. 

Samuel told everyone that the baby had been born ok, but then had stopped breathing and thus he decided to bury him in the back before letting Ruby see him at all. The other men had commiserated, the women had cried and the children had milled around Castiel and Deann while the whole village came together in this moment of sadness. They had been understanding and kept talking about how fate does as fate does. They consoled them saying they will surely have more children in the future, this was just something that happened. 

They could not say the same things again and again after it happened five more times. Ruby got pregnant, she delivered healthy babies and then they stopped breathing. Samuel buried then before she could actually see them properly. Ellen stopped being their midwife after the third child died. Rowena, who some said was a witch, took over the midwife duties, could not save the next three as well. If Samuel and Deann and Castiel were not so respected people of the community, they would have been publicly questioned by now. As it is, the killing was really talking a toll on his soul. His hair had turned white, his face long and his eyes infinitely sad. Ruby looked haggard now, and Samuel would have stopped trying to do anything except that she wanted a baby any way she could, so they kept on sleeping together. 

This next time Ruby got pregnant, she was very careful, she did not work much, she asked all the deities for help and promised sacrifices. She stopped drinking Castiel’s herbal tea. For she feared maybe they made things too easy for her. She strived and did anything she could, for she would keep this baby. Samuel’s heart broke seeing her like this. She secretly asked Rowena for some herbs that will keep her coherent in the time afterbirth and secretly ingested them right before she went into labour.

This was her seventh child in all, and as it turned out, it was a bonny wee lass. She cried with all her strength and looked so healthy, that Ruby had no doubt that she would survive. So when Samuel asked for the baby she handed her away, but something on his face, that she always used to miss, made her get up silently and follow her husband to his’ brother’s. She came screeching into the room when she heard Deann tell Samuel to bury the baby alive in the same spot as her siblings, trying to claw their faces out and screaming at Samuel to run away with the baby. When he didn’t move, she cajoled, she cursed, she ranted, but Samuel would not break his brother’s words, his brother and his brother’s mate, both sitting and looking profoundly sad but doing nothing to help her. 

She kept crying brokenly for the whole day, more so when Samuel came back alone, with no baby in sight, and tried to console her. When she kept crying the same the next day, Samuel had enough and stormed to his brothers. “Fix her,” he said, “I can keep the burden, but she cannot keep the grief. Fix her.”

Deann sighted and looked to Castiel, who stepped up for the first time in the whole matter. He said, “Samuel, come to our house tomorrow night one hour before midnight, and you will get all your answers. And please do not blame your brother; this was all my doing, me trying to help you. Tomorrow at one hour to midnight.”

Samuel nodded solemnly, relayed the information to Ruby whose tears were tapering off a bit now and promised to be there.

On the third night the couple came to Deann’s and Castiels and found two huge woven baskets in the room. Deann told them to sit and Castiel said, “You will take these two baskets and place them near where your children were previously buried, open mouth of the basket in the mud and sit on the back. You will not make a sound, you will not move, you will not answer no matter who asks or talks. You will settle before midnight and will leave your perch only in the light of the dawn.” Here Castiel turns to Ruby and says with utmost gravity, “If you ever had faith in me, in any feeling of love you had for me, for being your husband’s friend, for being your brother in law, for being your friend, you will not go tonight. I assure you that Samuel will come to no harm but I cannot assure the same of you. You are after all the mother.”

“But,” here Castiel falls onto his knees, “I beg you, please, don’t go. Please Ruby.”

“It’s ok Castiel I won’t,” Ruby says in a bit of awe of the tears flowing from Castiel’s eyes. 

***************************************************************************

Samuel reaches in time and sets up his basket. Ruby did not come but stayed at his brother’s house. She was still feeling pretty much upset to go to sleep, so decided to keep vigil for him, to wait till he returns to learn everything. When it reaches midnight nothing happens. However, one hour later, the muddy marshy water starts to bubble. Samuel wait for something to actually happen, to make sense of the tragedy that his own family made him act out against his wife and children. While he is musing thus, a voice suddenly speaks out so clearly that Samuel almost falls off his basket.

“Hey Lilith, how were the parents when you saw them?” asks a voice like that of a mid 20’s man. He is answered by a child like voice that titters and giggles through its answers. The child says, “Oh you know, the same sack of sadness and good intention. Ruby is just about going mad. Of course if I were to have lived, I would have made her suffer more, but for the infuriating angel.”

Another voice says, “Ah yes the angel. Just our luck that an angle ended up being our uncle. I was supposed to kill Deann and make it look like a robbery had taken place and then later burn away all of their lore and the like.”

“Ah Alastair, Deann was one mofo I would have love to hurt till he couldn’t say anything. Make him look insane so that my dear father would have himself turned against his brother to stand with his son. I would have killed Ruby before his eyes of course.”

“Azazel, Lilith, Alastair, Tom and Meg, you all had such grand plans. Mine was much simpler see. I just planned to die at the ripe old age of 8 years old just before my mother, while a wild dog mauled me to shreds," cackled another.

And thus it went for hours, how each of the children would have brought more and more unhappiness, sadness on their parents by thieving, murdering, manipulating and much if it weren’t for the interference of the damn angel. Samuel, finally understanding why his brother and Castiel has acted the way they did and told him to do what he did, felt immensely grateful that he got this chance to understand. He was also thankful that Ruby did not come. She would not have listened as silently as him, and might have tried to go to her children. So he listened on, as they listed more and more things they had plans to do and when it dawned, he stepped away a calmer and happier man, his soul at ease and immensely grateful to his brother and his brother’s mate. 

When he relayed the same she was not as utterly convinced and her distrust of his brother and his mate did lessen. What finalised the forgiveness was the fact that when Ruby got pregnant again and gave birth to a baby boy, both Deann and Castiel gave their blessings to their child with their heart and it was doubtful whether a man more happy than Samuel was to be found in the whole wide world.

**Author's Note:**

> Ok, so I based this story on a native folklore off a collection published more than a century ago. I read this one quite late and have always loved how macabre it is. The moral was of course that one should always listen to one’s elders even when one doesn’t want to, even when it is hurtful. I have embellished the story a lot, the original story being much more simple and concise. I really enjoyed writing this and hope you enjoyed reading this as well. Unbeated. Looking forward to the comments, crits, kudos, anything fellas, enjoy.


End file.
